Explore the Era

Delve into the postwar Los Angeles art world in this online archive, which provides additional material related to the exhibitions on view at the Getty Center. Learn about hipsters and happenings, and the venues across the city where all the action took place through images from the archives and first-hand accounts with the artists.

Clockwork Malibu

Clockwork Malibu, Anthony Friedkin

Clockwork Malibu, 1978, Anthony Friedkin. Gelatin silver print. 11 15/16 x 18 5/16 in. Gift of Sue and Albert Dorskind. © Anthony Friedkin

On View at the Getty Center: In Focus Los Angeles 1945-1980

While Anthony Friedkin has documented subjects as diverse as the marginalized gay community of San Francisco, convicts at Folsom Prison, and brothels in New York, it is the Southern California coastline that has remained a recurrent theme throughout his forty-five-year career. The Los Angeles native took up photography about the same time he learned to surf. His images of waves deftly communicate the primordial power and elusive mysteries that he ascribes to the ocean. This photograph of surfer Rick Dano on an early morning drive up the coast conveys a mood of quiet, anticipatory harmony.